


diluted

by seedisms



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV), Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Angst, F/M, Romance, Slow Burn, The Winter Soldier - Freeform, also lets throw in some agents of S.H.I.E.L.D, and needs a hug, are we sick of post-tws fics? I hope not!!!!, bucky is broken but guess what he might get fixed, bucky is broody, bucky is sad and hurt and just wants a homecooked meal, still some fluff tho
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-29
Updated: 2019-12-04
Packaged: 2020-02-10 00:41:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 8
Words: 14,289
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18649423
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/seedisms/pseuds/seedisms
Summary: He's straight out of the Potomac and the only words in his mind are a name and an address. He's not entirely sure how he's going to get there, but he drudges himself away from the cacophony of crashing helicarriers and towards her.For some reason, it's always been her.





	1. HELP YOU

**THE PROLOGUE**

* * *

 

It's two in the morning and she's woken up by the murmur of voices from the TV. It's weird, because the voices are coming from the TV in the living room, and she  _ distinctly  _ remembers turning it off. 

She likes sleeping in her room, she didn't make the purchase of a California King to just sleep bunched up on the couch. So when she makes her trek to the living room, empty handed because even though she lives in D.C., her apartment complex is pretty secure and she wasn't expecting her stomach to fill with lead. Her heart freezes and she immediately wishes she would have traveled more, crossed more things off her bucket list when she sees the looming silhouette standing in front of the screen. 

Height wise, he's not the tallest. Definitely taller than her, but its his width that scares the shit out of her. His back is to her -  he's dense and all muscle. The reflection of the TV off of him catches her eye and she instantly furrows her brow. 

_ What the fu- _

He's realized she's behind him, and he swiftly turns to her. Most of his features are still shadowed out, but he's wearing a one-sleeved tactical vest along with tight, black pants. She doesn't miss the knives or the gun in its holster, and she definitely notices the reflection was coming from his  _ metal  _ arm.

She doesn't speak, doesn't move because she's been in this situation before, and her smart-ass remarks are only going to get her stabbed. Or shot. Or tortured. Or all three? She's assessing in her head, she knows he'll beat her if she attacks, and he'll catch her if she runs. She's on one of the top floors of her complex and the balcony was never really an option anyway. She decides the option of not reacting is her best bet. The last thing she notes is that somehow this figure is familiar to her, and as she chases that trail, the words of the TV drift between them. 

"- _ falling in the Potomac. It is unclear what the status of S.H.I.E.L.D is and whether it still stands, but a massive information leak has followed the disaster in D.C. Steve Rogers, also known as Captain America, is still missin-" _

He reacts to the worlds of the newscaster and promptly turns to force his fist through the middle of the TV. The sound abruptly stops and the living room is swathed in darkness. The lights from downtown Stamford still shine, and although they aren't in complete darkness, its much,  _ much worse _ than before. 

He still doesn't say a word when he removes his hand, causing the TV to dangle from its mount on the wall. She purses her lips at this and if he wanted to kill her, he'd have done it now. She takes three steps back and reaches behind her to flick on one the light switches. 

He narrows her eyes at her movements but doesn't react. He obviously doesn't consider her a threat, and when the light she turned on in the kitchen partly illuminates the living room, they lock eyes. 

_ He's dirty, and bleeding,  _ she notes in her head. She sees the marks of his boots trailing from the front door and she doesn't even waste her time wondering how he could've gotten in. He's still staring at her, but his whole demeanor doesn't match his initial appearance. Once a hulking, scary figure in the darkness is now a noticeably drooping, enervated man. She notes his wounds and wonders when the blood loss is finally going to make him pass out. She can tell he's gritting his teeth and consuming everything in him not to slump against the ground. The tension is growing and she's done playing the waiting game. 

"Can I help you?" she says as he just... _ stares _ at her. He seems like a guy who doesn't really use his words when he could just as easily use his fists so the question stuns him. Why she wasn't screaming or trying to escape is beyond him, and he might be on his way to understanding why her name was one of the first 10 in Zola's algorithm. It's why he went to her. She wasn't easy to track, but after being described as a ghost story for almost 70 years, you learn how to find people who don't want to be found.  

She narrows her eyes and he loses the fight he had waged against exhaustion. He slumps to his knees and then finally falls to his side, narrowly missing the coffee table. She watches him go down and tries not to get pissed at the sight of his blood seeping into her wood floor. 

"Alright buddy," she sighs as she grabs his legs and drags him into her en suite. With an immense amount of strength she really did not know she had, she shoves his incapacitated self into her walk-in shower. 

"Yeah, of course you can sneak into my house, scare the shit out of me, break my TV and bleed all over my floor," she mutters to herself as she strips him of her gear. She loses count of all the knives she removes from his body and also sets them along with his gun on the vanity. The boots are bulky and a  _ pain in the ass  _ to take off, and the vest-long sleeve shirt combo he has going on is even worse. She marvels at his metal arm and notes the haphazard gears and exposed wires from within it. The scars and bruises are abundant along his torso, and she decides the pants will stay on. 

She pulls on the hand-held shower head and starts to clean the grime from his hair and his face. She stays away from the arm because she's not sure if its waterproof or not, and if he finds out she ruined his arm she'll really be dead. But it's not like she won't be once he wakes up. He smells like metal and river muck and based on what he was watching on her TV, that's probably where he came from. 

"Who are you," she whispers to herself as she turns off the water and somewhat attempts to dry him off. His wounds are healing, but he's most likely dehydrated and malnourished. She closes the glass door to the shower and leans against the bathroom counter, watching his unconscious figure along with the rise and fall of his chest. 

Whatever the baggage he's carrying can wait till morning, she decides and leaves the bathroom to return back to bed.


	2. NO QUESTIONS

**CHAPTER ONE**

* * *

 

 

It’s now eight in the morning, and somehow she was able to fall asleep soundly. The fact that she had a very large and dangerous, yet completely exhausted man in her bathroom didn’t cross her mind once her head hit the pillow. 

When she reluctantly gets out of bed to check his pulse, she feels the beats that are few and far between. Based on his physique, she assumes he’s got a pretty low heart rate so she doesn’t sweat it. He’s healing, and probably hasn’t gotten more than an hour or two of sleep at a time for God knows how long.

She leaves the bathroom and makes her way to the kitchen, starting a pot of coffee and then turning on the stove so she can make breakfast. He could wake in the next couple hours, or in the next couple days. As she cracks eggs into the pan and pulls out sausage links (cause unlike the rest of the population, she’s not a bacon person), she realizes she’s a little unprepared. Not that there’s a book on what to do when someone sneaks into your home and promptly passes out without a word, but she still thinks she should have some kind of game plan. 

“JARVIS?” She calls as she flips the eggs to be over-easy. 

“ _ Yes, Ms. Abrams?”  _

“Is there any news on what happened in D.C?”

“ _ It seems that HYDRA hijacked Project Insight to destroy SHIELD from the inside out. Captain Rogers was on one of the helicarriers as it crashed, and according to Ms. Romanoff, he wasn’t alone.” _

“What do you mean he wasn’t alone?” she asked as she transferred the eggs from the pan to the plate. 

“ _ A HYDRA asset referred to as The Winter Soldier went after Captain Rogers. Captain Rogers has been found, but the status of The Winter Soldier is inconclusive - it seems he either died in the crash or somehow escaped undetected.” _

She recalls his reaction to the TV the night before, or more like a few hours ago. The man in her shower must be this so-called  _ Winter Soldier. _ JARVIS also notified her of a massive leak of SHIELD information, courtesy of Natasha, so she’ll no doubt have to catch up on that aspect. 

She hears a crash from her bathroom and quickly makes her way over to her en suite. The man unconscious in her shower is now conscious, and the sound must have been him knocking over all of her products as he got up. Still dizzy on his feet, he grasps the glass door and only cracks it a little as he makes his way out. His hair is clean and dry and waving against his face, his pants are still damp and his torso is bare. In the whirlwind of last night’s events, she missed the angry, gnarled skin where the metal met his shoulder. He notices her staring and his eyes bore into hers until she looks away. 

“I know I asked this last night, but I’m assuming you don’t remember because moments later you hit the floor,” she started. His eyes never left her as she spoke. 

“But, can I help you? You show up in my apartment all dirty and dangerous, you break my TV, you stain my floor and you also sleep in my shower. Did you come here for a reason?”

He swallows,  _ hard.  _

“You-” He clears his throat, it’s deep and rough from years of unuse. “Lincoln Abrams.”

She tries not to let her eyes widen in surprise. His voice is gravel, but still wavers. It’s the opposite of what she expected to come out, she expected something deeper and more sinister. Especially if he is this so called ‘Winter Soldier’. She tries not to linger on how  _ good  _ her name sounded leaving his lips and- 

“Your name, that’s all I know.” He purses his lips and for a man with dozens of confirmed kills and assassinations, he feels disgustingly weak and exposed in front of her.

He’s clad in only his pants, and he can’t remember the last time he didn’t have shoes on. His whole memory bank is pretty scarce, he knows he was supposed to kill the man on the bridge, the man who called him  _ Bucky _ . Even hearing the name in his head felt foreign and left a strange taste in his mouth. He failed at his mission, pulled the man from the river, and followed the only other memory he had. Lincoln Abrams. He had a sick feeling within every synapse of his body then that he couldn’t stay wherever he was - D.C, maybe? He knew that people were going to be very angry at his disappearance, and the whole journey that brought him to be vulnerable in front of  _ whoever the hell Lincoln Abrams is _ is all muddled. 

Lincoln can see the gears turning in his head - he’s just as confused as she is. He’s got a very rare moment of vulnerability, of clarity, and she’s not sure if she should take advantage of it. 

“You need clothes,” she said as she walked into her bedroom. She didn’t really want to open Pandora’s box right now. He seems like he’s in some kind of limbo - he’s not quite the assassin he’s supposed to be, but if there’s another identity besides that one, he doesn’t know it. The name  _ Bucky _ , and  _ end of the line _ float around his head and he’s so consumed with them that he almost is startled by her sudden movement back into the bedroom. 

She returns to him with one of her old SHIELD Academy shirts and a pair of sweatpants. She hands them to him and he doesn’t move to take them so she just sets them on the counter. 

His eyes linger on the clothing and she refrains from letting out a deep sigh. 

“Breakfast is in the kitchen.” And with that, she closes the door behind her.   
  


* * *

 

The shirt is somewhat tight across his ridiculous torso, but it’s not ripping at the seams. The soft sensation of the sweatpants against his legs and the fact that the hard muscles of his quads, his hamstrings, his calves aren’t being compressed is a feeling he never knew he needed. For the first time in a long time, it felt like he could  _ breathe.  _

He’s slow coming to the kitchen, eyes darting around her apartment. It’s open concept, living room and kitchen are only separated by the long breakfast bar. Her elbows are on the island as she leans over it, one hand picking at her plate and the other one scrolling through whatever was in her hand. Its technological, that’s all he can confirm. 

The white cabinets and blue back splash makes him feel like a stain standing in the middle of it all. He’s dark and jagged whereas she seems not necessarily bright, but soft, and all of her edges are rounded where his are sharp. He lingers by the kitchen table in front of her and it takes her a second to notice he’s even there. 

He’s so damn silent, and upon feeling his presence she instantly locks her phone and puts it in her back pocket. Was she researching this HYDRA super soldier assassin? Yes. Did she find much? No. She shot a text to Skye asking her to look into some encrypted files that were leaked by Natasha because hacking wasn’t exactly Lincoln’s strong suit. 

She clears her throat as she sets down her fork. “I um-” she grabs a plate of at least 6 eggs, toast and a whole mess of sausage. “I hope you eat this? I figured you might be hungry.” She brings it to the table he’s just  _ standing _ near. 

She also sets down a full mug of black coffee because just looking at his appearance, this is not a man who likes cream and sugar. She also refrained from using her big Captain America mug -  that would’ve been in poor taste. 

He looks down at the food and back up to her. His movements are still somewhat lethargic, but still calculated and analytical. She feels weird watching him eat so she points her thumb to the balcony. 

“I’ll uh - be outside when you’re done. If you want more you can let me know or just help yourself.” 

Unlikely, he notes at the second option. He recognizes what he assumes is a fridge and a stove, but he wouldn’t even attempt to use them. 

She leaves, and he’s instantly picking up the fork and poking it into the first egg. The yolk pours out when he places it on the toast, and he’s instantly hit with a wave of nostalgia with the first bite. 

_ I like runny eggs,  _ he notes to himself. The sensation of just sitting down in a kitchen eating breakfast is foreign, and he doesn’t feel like himself. He’s not the soldier right now. He’s not planning how to kill Lincoln with every object in the kitchen, and he’s also not planning on torturing her. He knows he’s hungry as hell and he also knows with some strange fiber of his being that she’s going to help. Whatever feeling that is sates his  _ fight or fight _ response (because Bucky was never taught that there was another option). He can hear her muffled voice as she’s holding that piece of technology up to her ear, and that same fiber assures him that no, she’s not on the phone with HYDRA and she’s not learning his trigger words so he can be turned back into  _ the asset.  _

He doubts she even knows Russian anyway.

 

In a matter of minutes his plate is cleared and his mug is drained. He could still eat her out of all the food she owns, but he won’t push it. He begins to commit her floor plan to memory as he waits for her to leave the balcony. She’s sitting in one of the lounge chairs she has out there, arguing profusely with whoever she’s communicating with. He really hopes she isn’t talking to herself because he doesn’t want to deal with that. 

She eyes his figure from his peripherals and turns her attention back to her conversation. 

“Just..please,” she pleads into the phone. “No questions. I can explain it later.” 

Skye on the other line sighs, but gives in. “Just be safe about this, okay? I don’t know what crazy shit you’re onto, but Coulson, Fitz-Simmons and I all got your back.”

He’s not moving at the table, and _ if he died in her kitchen, she swears -  _

She hangs up the phone and makes her way back inside. As she approaches him, she notices his whole attention is dedicated to moving his metal arm. The gears whirl and the wires crackle sparks, and the arm moves with very shaky and not at all fluid movements. He’s growing frustrated and before she knows it he’s grabbed the empty mug and throw it at the wall.

The ceramic pieces fall to the ground and she frowns. 

“TV and mug,” she mumbles to herself. She grabs his plate before he can break that too and puts it in the dishwasher. 

His chest rises and falls, heavy with anger and doesn’t really know how to approach him. He resembles a caged animal and if she sticks her fingers through the bars he’ll most likely bite. 

“So, your arm…” she trails off. His eyes snap to hers and they’re no longer empty and drinking in her every movement like earlier. They’re hard, and the blues are now a dark slate. His expression hardens and he rises from the table harshly. 

“You’ll fix it,” he states. 

She scoffs. “Um, no I won’t? Honey, I've got an MD and a phD in biochemistry. I don't know what the hell I'd be dealing with.”

As if his expression could get anymore murderous, she immediately regrets using the term honey because now he’s _really_ gonna rip her throat out. 

“I don’t care,” he answers, and all traces of hesitance or uncertainty that he carried this morning are wiped clean. What she hears out of his mouth now sends a chill up her spine - it’s smooth, it’s deep, and it’s scary as fuck. 

“I can contact someone who can help,” she offers up. “Trust me, you don’t want me anywhere near that.”

Suddenly, he’s closer to her and his flesh hand reaches out and grabs her wrist. His grip is tightening but when her skin doesn’t depress beneath his squeezing and he doesn’t feel the familiar give of bone just before it snaps, Lincoln seizes his moment of confusion to snatch herself from his hold. 

He’s taken aback, and he’s starting to wonder just what he got himself into by coming here. He doesn’t know why her name came to the forefront of his mind as he pulled himself out of the Potomac, or why he would expect -  _ or even trust _ \- such a seemingly average girl to fix him. 

_ Fix my arm _ , he corrects himself. 

 

“My friends can keep secrets, they don’t ask questions, and I can just send them the specs of your arm, maybe they can make a how to guide on mechanical arms.”

He rolls the idea around his head and decides he can risk it. He can fight or kill his way out of any situation, and if she tries to betray or take advantage of him, he’s confident he could get rid of her. 

But her not crying out in pain when he grabbed her wrist bothers him, but it’s something he can deal with later. For now, he needs all limbs function. 

“No questions,” he responds, his own way of agreeing to her terms. 

“No questions,” she agrees. 

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whew. I'm going somewhere with this, I promise.


	3. INSEPARABLE

**CHAPTER TWO**

* * *

 

 

It really was a shame.

She earned her PhD in Biochem, studied her ass off memorizing every function and process of the human body, _tried_ to compete with Jemma Simmons, and left all the mechanical engineering to Fitz.

If she would’ve just taken the smallest interest in that line of work, she might have had a better appreciation for the complete masterpiece that she knew was laid out in front of her.

The entanglement of wires and machinery is interconnected with the very human parts of him and she’s never felt so useless as she scans his arm, hoping to send the specs to Fitz. Lincoln is acutely aware of how she’s almost sandwiched between his massive thighs and she knows his posture is on purpose, yet she feels the opposite of trapped.

She’s trying really hard not to falter under the weight of his stare. He’s scanning her face, analyzing every feature and committing it to memory. He looks for any signs that she’s conning him as she uses whatever is in her hand to scan his arm. His plates are crooked and he can see what lies inside, but he hasn’t made himself look.

Lincoln’s phone beeps and she’s successfully scanned his arm and sent it out to Fitz who will hopefully give her very detailed instructions on _what the hell to do with it_ shortly.

“So,” she clears her throat as she sets her phone on the kitchen table. He still has his thighs on either side of her and the sweatpants he’s wearing are straining to keep up with the sheer amount of muscle he has. He’s...for lack of a better term, beefy. But every angle and plane of his body is made up of thick muscle that has been built over 70 years. She did some quick research while he was eating breakfast, and the man in front of her was the famed Winter Soldier. Hydra’s prized toy. She felt wrong calling him a toy, but she doubted they saw him as anything different.

“What do I call you?” 

Her eyes snap up to his and they remain neutral, his expression unreadable. He nods to his arm.

“Did you get what you needed?” His voice is still getting used to...y’know. Being used.

She follows his motion. “Y-Yeah, I did. I should know how to fix it soon.”

He stands up and makes his way to the front door, grabbing a baseball hat off of the coat rack.

“I’ll be back.”

 

He slams the door behind him.

 

* * *

 

He’s been gone for hours, and Lincoln took those precious moments researching about this guy and trying to decipher the instructions Fitz sent regarding his arm. SHIELD was gone, Fury was dead, and countless operations and files linked to it all was just out in the ether. She pulled what she could with her very intermediate-level knowledge of decryption. One of the files contained the image of a very familiar face, and she spent a good chunk of the time she had learning basic Russian.

Джеймс Барнс - воинский учет обслуживания, развертывания и экспериментов.

_James Barnes - Military registration of service, deployment and experiments._

The man lurking in her apartment and virtually holding her hostage was James Buchanan Barnes. The words from SHIELD Academy and countless WWII documentaries rung through her head, _“the only howling commando to give his life in service of his country.”_

He didn’t know that though - Hydra wiped him and put him in cyro countless times. Lincoln didn’t know that he left her apartment to come to the same realization that she did. He didn’t see himself staring back at him at the Captain America exhibit in the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum. He sees clips of a man who shares his face, his body, but feels as though he’s a ghost. He sees the man on the bridge - Steve - sees him slinging his arm around him and laughing with Bucky. Laying out war plans and strategies with Bucky.

_“Best friends since childhood....inseparable on both schoolyard and battlefield”_

The words give him a headache. This Steve he sees is too big, and seeing the smaller version feels less foreign. He reads about Erskine, about Stark, about the serum. It makes him feel sick, knowing Hydra put him through the same hell. He wasn’t able to be God’s Righteous Man, Bucky was the tool of evil and seeing how far he had fallen from the man he was in 1945 forced him out of the Smithsonian.

He’s sitting on the steps outside the building, head in his hands as he quietly tries out the word on his tongue.

“Bucky.”

It’s dangerous to be so out in the open, even though he acquired some layers to hide his physique. He keeps her hat, it’s a plain back and he had to readjust it because her head is ridiculously small.

“Bucky.”

The memories are jagged and sharp and every one that returns to him _hurts._ He remembers the fall, the red in the snow, the dragging of his body. The experiments, the torture, the trials. He focuses on breathing. He didn’t know that to call those years, those times where he was manipulated and an assassin and nothing more than Hydra’s asset. He can’t black them out, they just keep coming.

“Bucky.”

He feels his arm, how the metal seems to eat away at his skin, consuming every synapse and all his neurons are firing and all they’re telling his brain is _pain! pain! pain!_

He focuses on earlier, on how Lincoln looked with the blue light of her scanner reflecting on her face. How he knew she was completely out of her element, but it didn’t keep her from simply _admiring_ the metal prosthetic. In her mind she was working out how such a thing could be to interwoven with his body where every motion moved so fluidly - it probably moved smoother when it isn’t damaged, she surmised. She didn’t know how many deaths it caused, how many guns and knives it held, or how many windpipes it closed off. She was fresh and new - a clean slate. He was scarred where she was smooth and he didn’t know where to go from here.

Actually, he did know. He took one last deep breath, stood up, and started to make his way to her. Again.

 

* * *

 One solid thud sounds against her door. It’s nighttime, and Lincoln rushes up from the couch to get it.

He’s on the other side, in different clothes but the same hat and he walks past her wordlessly. His demeanor is different. He’s drained and he looks like he’d been run over. A couple times. He goes to sit on the couch and stares at his hands between his parted legs. She slowly follows, sitting on the other end of the couch. She watches him and she can almost feel the war waging in his head.

“You can call me Bucky,” is all he says.

The name feels forced, but you know he means it, he _wants_ it. She purses her lips as she continues to watch him. He turns his head to look at her, expecting a response or at least a reaction but she’s just staring at him with soft eyes and the smoothest features and it makes Bucky want to scream.

“Okay,” is all she says.

He swallows and returns his gaze to his lap.

“Can you fix my arm tonight?”

She almost laughs at that, but his whole attitude has shifted to a much softer, less threatening man so she decides to hold onto it as long as she can.

“It might take longer than just one night, but I can start now,” she smiles at him and he immediately avoids the eye contact. “First, I’m gonna need a lot of coffee.”

She gets up to start a pot and he eases himself from his hunched over position and lies his back against the couch, closing his eyes and letting out a steady stream of air. He’s repeating to himself that he’s got some semblance of safety with her. She’s making coffee and she’s going to poke around in his metal monstrosity and he’s going to let her do that because _he asked her to. He asked for help and she’s just giving it to him. No strings, no favors._

As she returns from the kitchen, she sits just a tiny bit closer to him. Her body his facing him and her arm is resting on the back of the couch, her forehead leaning on her fist. Her legs are folded underneath her and he can’t get distracted by just how soothing and comforting her presence is.

“So Bucky,” she tries out his name again and decides she likes it. “Wanna tell me about yourself?”

Something takes control of Bucky and before he can even think, he snorts and says “I think we’re going to need something a lot stronger than coffee.”

His words are so sudden and foreign and he wonders if that’s the Bucky from 70 years ago peeking through. She beams at his words and he can’t help but reciprocate with a small upturn of his mouth.

“You and I are going to get along very well,” she laughs. His eyes meet hers across the couch.

  
He thinks about the day he had, about the _days_ he’s had and how all these events had led him to be sitting on her couch, waiting for coffee to brew. He doesn’t deserve it, he knows that. The clarity he’s reached won’t last for long but he’s going to hold onto it for as long as he can because for once since he got drafted to the 107th, he feels like he’s on the right track.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So small change - i just made lincoln's location in D.C instead of CT. Just worked out with the plot better. Thanks!! We're getting some dialogue and we're getting some plot and something is forming here y'all i swear.


	4. IN YOUR VEINS

CHAPTER THREE 

 

So the first step of repair was just to clear the gunk out. She maneuvers the metal plates, scooping out remnants of the Potomac and other debris as he watches. 

She didn’t drink any of the coffee due to the fact she wanted to keep her steady hand, but Bucky downed a pot easily. And like he said, he’d needed something stronger. The bottle of whiskey loose in his flesh hand did nothing but calm his nerves as he had a very beautiful girl poking around in his metal appendage that killed dozens. It was weird. 

He still took heavy swigs, especially when she’d nick somewhere sensitive in her clean up process. She assumed the taste of whiskey was familiar and that’s what he welcomed. It was nearing two in the morning when her phone buzzed. Bucky immediately tensed and watched as she answered. 

“Abrams,” she says, her eyes meeting his. Bucky’s eyes held a warning as he listened to the voice on the other end. 

_ “Rogers is in bad condition, I want you to look at him. I’ve already sent you the coordinates. Make sure you’re alone,”  _ the voice of Natasha Romanoff was immediately recognized and Lincoln felt her stomach drop. She was currently mending the man who put Steve in the condition he’s in now, and it felt like she was betraying him.  

Natasha barely waits for Lincoln to acknowledge before she hangs up. Bucky’s closing the metal plating in his arm and already it feels lighter. Still not entirely functional, but it was a start. He wanted her to get it done tonight but her being no expert in cybernetic limbs had him set his expectations low. 

She purses her lips, unsure of how to approach this situation. “I um,” she starts and he narrows his eyes at her. He heard the conversation, unbeknownst to her. “I have to go. I’ll be back, though I don’t know when.

“Steve,” Bucky tries the name on his lips and the familiarity and fondness that accompanies the sound feels weird to him. The man on the bridge, the man who let Bucky beat him within an inch of his life. 

The first man Bucky saved. 

Lincoln swallows. “I can keep a secret, and you’re more than welcome to stay here until I get back.”

She can easily go to her fellow SHIELD friends and rat out his location, capture him and make him face the crimes he’s committed all these years. He almost welcomes the idea. All the blood on his hands finally being avenged. He doesn’t deserve to be here, to have her fixing his arm with such delicacy and precision - despite a few moments where she nicked the wires, _ but that’s because she was frequently distracted by the ridiculously attractive man in front of her, not that he’d ever need to know that _ \- it made him sick. To be fed, and showered, and treated so well seemed like a form of tortue in itself. Another ploy by HYDRA probably, to give him all he’s ever wanted just to rip it away and show him who’s truly in control. 

She takes his lack of response as permission and leaves the couch to put on an actual outfit. Her cotton shorts and SHIELD academy crewneck is not something she needs to show up in, but Bucky can’t take his eyes off of the long, tanned expanse of her legs. They were so close, tucked underneath her as she situated herself to get the best angle on his arm. The alcohol also helped in dealing with her presence moments ago. Her new absence makes him frown and he resents the woman on the phone. 

She’s clicking on her phone when she walks out of the bedroom. She’s in jeans and a pretty casual sweatshirt, but she’s got a kit in the other hand and she’s grabbing her keys off the hook as she makes her way to the door. She pauses in the entry and turns around to him, still in the same position on the couch. 

“I’ll be back,” she says and she pauses before her next words. “I hope you’ll still be here.”

She doesn’t wait to gauge his reaction as she turns back around and leaves the apartment, the echo of the door resonating off the walls and Bucky on the couch.

“I will,” he answers, even though she’s already gone.   
  


* * *

Lincoln drives to a pretty basic hospital in D.C and immediately understands why Natasha would want her perspective on Steve’s care. Why isn't he in a better facility is beyond her - Stark must have some pretty cutting edge medical places, but she’s assuming that Steve’s injuries must have required urgent care.

She finds the room and after a quick three knocks, she enters the room. Natasha is facing the window and there’s an unfamiliar man to the right of Steve. Steve himself is black and blue, cut up and bruised and she tries not to think about how  _ Bucky did this.  _

The man stands up and offers his hand, “Sam Wilson,” he greets her with a beautiful smile that she returns. “Heard you’re the good doctor,” he laughs. 

She shrugs as she shakes his hand. “Lincoln Abrams, and yeah. I guess you could call me that?” 

Natasha gives her a small smile before motioning her head toward Steve. She hands Lincoln his chart and as she skims it, then smiles sadly at Steve’s unconscious form on the bed. 

“Well, he’s broken. Like, everywhere,” she offers as she approaches Steve’s side and starts prodding at his rib cage. “He’s almost healed though, I’d give him another day.”

Sam looks at Natasha. “That’s all we needed her for?”

Natasha rolls her eyes. “The doctors here don’t understand Steve’s serum or the extend of his healing. Her opinion matters more than anybody’s.” 

“His vertebra took the brunt of the damage in the fall though. Even when he’s back up and moving he’s gonna need to take it easy because I don’t want him going on a twenty-five mile run and then paralyzing himself. If he can even do that. I don’t know if the serum combats nerve damage,” Lincoln smooths his hair down and rests her hand on his forehead. 

She then faces the other two in the room. “Need me for anything else? Can’t do much when he’s asleep, and when he’s awake all I’m gonna do is yell at him.”

Natasha shakes her head. “I need to brief you on what happened.” Her side eye towards Sam has him raising his hands and making his way to the door. 

“I get it. I’m leaving. Gonna go get me some renowned hospital coffee,” he winks at Lincoln before leaving the room. 

She turns from Steve to Natasha. “I like him. Can we keep him?” 

Natasha disregards the question before handing her a file. It’s a blank manila folder, not crowded with the usual ‘SHIELD - CONFIDENTIAL’ garb and it makes Lincoln nervous as she grabs it.

In it are several photos - Fury’s body underneath a sheet, a dark silhouette with an unmistakable sheen that was no doubt Bucky’s arm, Sam and another man who look like they’re in the desert. 

“Fury is…” Lincoln trails off, unable to take her eyes off of the photo of him. 

“Alive,” Natasha finishes. Lincoln snaps her head up and the weight on her shoulders instantly disappears. “Had to fake his death to figure out who the hell was trying to kill him. And we did.” She’s referencing the photo of Bucky and Lincoln isn’t sure if she’s able to outwit Natasha and pretend like she doesn’t know a damn thing about any Winter Soldier. 

“He’s accredited with over two dozen assassinations in the last seventy years, and it turns out him and Steve were pals in the ‘40s.”

There’s other photos of him, and her heart lurches when she sees the picture of him in what must have been the cryofreeze, and paperclipped to the bottom of it was a small picture of when Bucky was Sergeant Barnes, not the Winter Soldier.

It makes her sick, but she can’t let on to Natasha that she is currently harboring his man in her apartment. Or that she thought ‘40s Bucky was extremely attractive, but Lincoln thinks she prefers the long hair and the slight stubble he has now.

“Pierce was HYDRA, used the Winter Soldier to kill Fury while also hijacking the helicarriers to kill everyone that was a threat to HYDRA.” Natasha continues and Lincoln is still looking at the picture of cryofrozen Bucky. 

“Like who?” Lincoln asks as she continues to thumb through the file. 

“Tony, Bruce…” she pauses. “ You.” 

Lincoln closes the folder. “Me? Why?”

Natasha purses her lips. “You know why. Because of what’s in your veins - “

“I got it,” Lincoln interrupts and swallows hard. “So what’s the next move?”

“Steve is no doubt going to track Barnes, and Wilson will most likely go with him. The world has to believe Fury is dead if we have any chance of finally destroying HYDRA, and I want you close in case I need you.”

Lincoln pats her on the shoulder. “I’m not going anywhere. But if you need me, let me know. I’ll keep a close eye on Steve and Sam as they try to find him.” She sounds cool and collected, but she’s flipping shit on the inside. Steve is going to try and find Bucky, and even though Bucky is the best assassin or asset or whatever in HYDRA history, Steve is  _ good. _ And no doubt he’ll follow Bucky’s bread crumbs until he winds up at her apartment and finds her and Bucky playing house. 

The newfound protectiveness she has over her new friend (?) is foreign and she feels like she’s really breaking the rules. Bucky and Steve used to be inseparable, and she can only imagine the betrayal he’ll feel when he finds out she knew where Bucky was the whole time. He pulled Steve from the river, but he came _ to her _ . She doesn’t know why, and she’s pretty sure Bucky doesn’t either, but that has to count for something, right?   

All she knows is that she’s gotta get back to her apartment and figure out what the hell she’s going to do with Bucky. She’s got a few days at most until Steve is completely healed, but she’s going to need that time to fix the damn arm. 

When Natasha thanks her for coming and leaves the hospital room, Lincoln slumps to the chair situated next to Steve’s bed. She grabs his hand and kisses the top of it. 

“I’m sorry,” she whispers and stands back up to leave and make her way back to Bucky. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> okay so im introducing some plot here, kinda testing the waters cause i didnt think i'd make it this far but feedback and kudos are appreciated!! ty!


	5. HAD NOTHING

Her knuckles are white on the steering wheel and she’s trying to keep herself from getting sick.

The image of Fury’s body under a white sheet plagues her consciousness. The man that hand picked her for the academy, gave her a chance to prove herself against great minds like Fitz-Simmons. Natasha’s reassurance that he’s alive did nothing to help the sour in her stomach, and she doesn’t even want to unpack what she saw in Bucky’s file. 

She was harboring the man who put the lives of two of the most important people to her in jeopardy. How could she look at Steve, battered and bruised in a hospital bed, and still defend the man who snuck into her apartment less than 48 hours ago?

She didn’t want to come to terms with it, but whoever the Bucky was that fought Steve and went after Fury was different than the one who ate eggs and drank coffee in her kitchen. Different than the one who left himself vulnerable so she could fix his arm. Hydra’s cryofreezing and constant mind wipes left him a perfect machine. To her, all he was was  _ human.  _

So when she turns the key in the lock and steps into her apartment, she tries not to visibly deflate when she finds it empty. 

She feels so stupid - telling him she wanted him to stay. She puts her keys in the bowl and her medical kit on the ground. The whiskey bottle is on the coffee table and her various tools used only a few hours ago still lay on the couch. 

He’s gone and she accepts it. She accepts it when she retreats to her room, throwing off her jeans in exchange for some cotton shorts. She accepts it when she climbs into bed and when she tucks herself under the covers, willing herself not to dwell on how empty her apartment now feels.

* * *

 

 Lincoln sleeps till the late afternoon. Granted, she did get home and go to sleep when the rest of the world would normally be waking up. She’s never been a late riser, and looking at the time on her phone makes her stomach feel sick. The text messages that litter the screen also bring the same effect. 

 

**Natasha - 6:10 am**

_ BTW - Triskelion kind of doesn’t exist anymore. Stark is willing if you want work.  _

 

**Steve - 47m**

_ Just woke up and Sam told me you visited. Can I come over to talk? _

**Steve - 30m**

_ Disclaimer: Sam will also be in attendance. Hope that isn’t a deal breaker.  _

 

She’s mildly miffed that Steve is awake already, but that’s just typical of his stubborn ass. She doesn’t want him to stop over, explain to her the whole ‘SHIELD is gone and my best friend who I thought was dead is a murderer and we need to find him’ situation, and expect her help. She can’t look at him and lie. Not while he’s conscious, at least. 

There’s another string of texts on the screen that has her heart beating against her lungs, slamming against her ribcage. 

 

**UNKNOWN - 9:14 am**

_ You told me to stay. I still have things I need to take care of.  _

**UNKNOWN - 10m**

_ I’ll come back.  _

 

The unfamiliar number could only be him. He’s taking care of whatever it is he needs to do, and somewhere along the way he got ahold of a cell phone to let you know. To tell you that  _ he’d be back.  _

There’s a smile tugging at the corners of her lips as she slides open the texts and just stares. At the back of her mind, she’s impressed that he got a phone and also figured out how to use it, but then again he pulled himself out of the Potomac river and stumbled into her house, so she’s not that surprised. 

She quickly responds to Steve, letting him know he can swing by whenever. Lincoln also isn’t entirely sure on what to do about Natasha’s text. She needs something to keep her busy, and since there isn’t anything left in D.C, she might as well go to Tony. She’s not fond of uprooting to Manhattan, especially when Bucky is in the wind and said he’d come back but not  _ when _ he’d come back. 

Bucky’s more than capable of finding her again, she decides and composes a text to Tony: 

 

**To: Stark**

_ Heard you’re in need of someone to fix your boo-boos? _

He responds in less than a minute. 

**Stark - Now**

_ Think community boo-boos, though my knees aren’t what they used to be. Interested?  _

**To: Stark**

_ Only if you buy me a big fancy Manhattan loft ;-) _

**Stark - now**

_ I’m offended you thought you had to ask. You’ll have the keys by tonight.  _

 

As soon as she sets her phone down, it dings again. Steve’s already on his way. Lincoln rolls her eyes in conjunction with rolling out of bed. She throws on a pair of distressed jeans and a long sleeve. 

Before she can change her mind, she also sends out a text to Bucky: 

 

**To: UNKNOWN**

_ I’ll be in Manhattan. _

 

The text is just a courtesy, she tells herself. She’s definitely not hoping he’ll text back, tell her what he’s doing or if he’s okay. The minutes tick by as she cleans up the whiskey and remnants of last night - or morning? She makes herself breakfast and her phone remains frustratingly silent. 

She’s halfway through her second mug of coffee - turns out she got less sleep than she thought - when a methodical string of knocks sound on her door. She sets down her tacky Mjölnir mug and opens the door, moving to the side so the hulking frame of Steve can pass. Sam follows behind and raises his eyebrows at her, giving her the male ‘What’s Up’ nod. 

She closes the door behind them. 

“Coffee? I know it’s basically dinner time but I had a very late night,” she offers when they follow her into the kitchen. Sam snorts at her mug. 

They both decline and Lincoln leans against the counter, sipping the hot liquid as Sam takes a seat at the island and Steve leans his forearms on it, his head hanging low before he brings it back up to meet your eyes. 

The silence is weird, so she breaks it. “Should I congratulate you both on polluting the Potomac or...?” 

Steve disregards the comment. His face is still tinged black and blue, and his busted lip looked better than it did this morning. 

“What all did Nat catch you up on?” He asks. 

She shrugs. “Enough for me to know what your next steps are.”

Steve and Sam share eye contact and Sam shakes his head. 

“Don’t look at me,” he says.

You can physically feel the gears turning in Steve’s head, the turmoil and conflict that’s in his head right now. She and Steve had always been close like that - she’d always be one step ahead before he even knew he was behind.

“Come with us,” he says, his blue eyes melting into hers and she purses her lips. 

“Steve, I’m better with a scalpel than a gun. Do you really think I’d be useful?” 

Sure she was a trained SHIELD agent, but she was a doctor first. A surgeon. Whereas FitzSimmons went with Coulson in the field, she went into residency. Honed her skills with Helen Cho. Most importantly, she took the Hippocratic Oath. She’d never been comfortable in the crossfire, much to her Grandmother’s dismay. 

“You can help in ways I know you don’t want to,” He presses and she creases her brow. Lincoln sets her mug down roughly and the hot liquid splashes onto the counter and the hand that’s still gripping it. 

Sam opens his mouth to comment on the scalding liquid hitting her skin, but closes it slowly after seeing her lack of reaction.

Lincoln completely disregards the mess as she wipes off her hand and folds her arms over her chest, cocking her head and meeting Steve’s eyes. 

“I’m sorry,” he tries to salve his words. “You’re more valuable than a doctor. I want you to realize that.”

“I do realize that,” she bites back. “But it’s not the life I wanted nor asked for.”

Steve opens his mouth to respond, but he knows he’s backpedaling and Lincoln’s not done. 

“You volunteered Steve. I was  _ forced _ . I was you before I could even have an independent thought in my head.” 

Sam’s confusion fills up the room but he’s wise enough to keep quiet. Steve hangs his head once more and Lincoln feels the guilt pool in her stomach. 

“I’ll help you Steve, but I’m not coming.”

All three of them are silent. Steve is the first to break it.

“He was there when my mom died.” His hands are now braced against the island and his focus is now on the countertop. “He pulled me out of fights, was always there for me. I watched him  _ die. _ ”

The air of the kitchen is now heavy and Lincoln moves her gaze to her feet. 

“I came out of the ice over 70 years ago and I thought I lost everything.” He pauses, takes a breath and looks at Lincoln. “Even when I had nothing, I had Bucky. And now he's alive. I have to find him.”

She’s chewing the inside of her cheek. She had Bucky on her couch less than 24 hours ago, and here is Steve, baring his soul and his past to her and she’s harboring the one thing that can make it all go away.

Yet, it’s not her secret to tell. 

His best friend beat him within an inch of his life, and Steve can focus on nothing else but getting him back. The look on his face shatters her, and Sam is sitting, staring at his clasped hands on the counter. She feels  _ real shitty. _

“And you will,” she pushes herself off the counter and over to Steve. She grabs one of his hands and folds it into her own. His rigid stance instantly softens and she rests her forehead against his deltoid. “I’m sure he’s looking for you, too.”

He gives her a small smile and she lets go. 

“I’m sorry,” Steve says sadly and she shakes her head. 

“All is well,” she assures him. “I’m always one call away if you need me, though.”

Steve and Sam make their way towards her door and Steve gives her a hug before he leaves. Sam gives her a two finger salute. 

“I’m also a call away,” he says with a grin. “You can need me whenever.”

Lincoln laughs and pushes Sam past her door frame. “Noted, Wilson.”

She closes the door before she can hear his reply. She turns, pressing her back against the door as she holds the hand that should have some type of burn on it and runs the pad of her thumb over the smooth skin. She swallows the lump in her throat and exhales. 

She’s got a lot of packing to do. 

  
  
  



	6. A LONG TIME

Radio silence. 

She’d been in Manhattan for weeks and had gotten _nothing._ He’s busy, he’s tying up loose ends. 

_He’ll come back. He said he would._

The vastness of the loft Tony provided for her amplifies her loneliness. The view of park avenue below, the Stark Tower adjacent. It’s crowded but empty. She hardly ever spends time here. 

She busies herself with Banner in the lab and he’s taken by surprise when she expresses her newfound interest in cryogenics and tissue regeneration. She tinkers on Stark’s suits when he’s not around. Runs tests on the actual structure and composition of vibranium - annoyed, but not surprised to find that it’s all completely alien. And only found in the poor, developing country of Wakanda. 

Every  so often, she gets calls from Steve. He tells her how close they get to finding Bucky only to find out he’s twelve steps ahead. The guilt is still there, heavy in her stomach but week by week it gets easier to stifle. 

Sometimes, Sam calls too. He likes to talk about his day and urges her to do the same.

But right now, she’s not busy. For the first time in what seems like a long time, she’s allowing herself to breathe. A glass of wine loose in her hand, she sits on the couch and watches the rain sheet against her windows and blur the view of Manhattan. 

She takes a sip of the wine and lets the tang fill her veins. It blanks her mind from the constant onslaught of thoughts and she welcomes it. The haze, the numb. She needs it, and as tacky as it seems for her to get _wine drunk to forget about a boy_ , there are worse things for her to do. 

But whatever entity that is pulling the strings of the universe seems to hate her. The buzz of her phone causes her eyes to drift to its location on the coffee table and she ignores it. The _what if?_ fills her gut and she narrows her eyes when it buzzes again. She sets down the glass and grabs the phone.   


**UNKNOWN - 1m**

_Manhattan?_

 

**UNKNOWN - Now**

_Here._

 

The door to her apartment opens and closes and she turns her head over to the sound. His frame nearly covers the width of the door and she stares. 

His dark jacket and hat are sopping from the storm and he’s wringing his flesh hand with the gloved one. His eyes lift to meet hers and she _stares._

 _He’s not here,_ she thinks. _Too much wine, too much loneliness._

He sheds his jacket and his hat, runs a hand through his hair. It’s cleaner kept, and he’s adorned some stubble. The henley stretches across the wide expanse of his chest, the jeans tight on his thighs and his eyes still never leave hers. 

He’s gauging her reaction - _is she pissed? She’s definitely pissed._

He’s cautious when he steps further into the apartment and closer to the couch she’s on. She swallows and it’s the first movement he’s seen out of her. 

“I’m sorry,” he begins. “Couldn’t contact you.” He purses his lips tightly, thinking of what he’s done in the past weeks. He thought he was done with his old life, done with the Winter Soldier. But he needed him again, needed him to protect _her_. 

She rises from the couch slowly and stumbles, grasping at the arm of it as she steadies herself. Now he’s confused. 

She’s slow and focused in her walking as she approaches him and he doesn’t react when she reaches out a hand to grab a lock of his hair. 

“It’s longer,” she notes. His brows are furrowed and now she’s close and looking at him. His heart won’t settle in his chest. 

He can smell the sweetness on her breath, notes the empty bottle and nearly empty glass on the table. He holds back a laugh. She’s _drunk._

Her eyes are unfocused when she breaks their gaze and turns back to reoccupy her spot on the couch. 

 _“_ Welcome back,” she smiles. She grips the glass and takes another small sip. 

A good part of him wishes she was pissed at him. Angry that he just left with two texts explaining himself. But she’s drunk and he hadn’t had to deal with something like this since 1940. He’s jealous, wishes he could drown out everything with alcohol but the serum won’t let him. 

She notices he’s looking from the bottle to the glass in her hand and she offers the remainder to him. 

“Do you want some? It’s my special concoction since I can’t get drunk off of the normal stuff,” she smiles. 

He shakes his head and she shrugs, taking another sip.

“Do you know how frustrating it is,” she hiccups, “to go out with friends, down shots of whatever is in front of you, and have it do _absolutely nothing?”_  

She finishes the glass and places it back on the coffee table. She’s looking at him again, something dangerous in her gaze and he’s unsure just what he walked in on. 

“I thought I’d put my chemistry background to good use,” she says, but the smile slowly slips from her face. “Couldn’t use it to fix me, so I thought I could use it to make being me at least a little more bearable."

He doesn’t have the whole picture, isn’t even close to having all the pieces to the puzzle. When he was gone, he moved through instinct. He eliminated anyone with knowledge of her. To protect her. He didn’t remember why her name resonated within the Soldier’s head, but he took the reins when Bucky left. He had one last mission, a few more names to tick off of a list. He’s been silent ever since. 

_She makes him quiet._

She pats the spot next to her and he sits, turning his body to face her just like she is him. She places her elbow on the back of the couch and rests her head in her hand. 

She could look at him forever. _Wants_ to look at him forever. 

“What’s in you is in me,” she smiles sadly. “Not as potent, doesn’t give me the same effects, but the framework is the same.”

She reaches out to his metal arm, it’s got a couple new scratches and she notices he’s tried to scrub off the red star. She runs her fingers down the metal plating and Bucky curses that he can only feel the pressure, not her touch.

“I know,” he responds. “The Soldier knew that. He knew others did too. That’s why I had to go.”

The effects of the wine are starting to dull and the conversation begins to sober her up. 

“Why would he care about me?” she responds, her hand now playing with his metal digits. He lets her, the feeling of soft, gentle touches is foreign to him and he’s selfish - he never wants her to stop. 

Bucky doesn’t know what role she plays in his life. Apparently, neither does she. It’s a magnetic pull to her, and he could hardly keep away. She’s enthralling, enigmatic and soothes the ever constant war within himself. He can’t trust himself, his own mind. But when she’s around, he’s not so worried. 

“I don’t know,” he says softly, he’s nearly melting at her touch. 

She returns her hand to her lap and Bucky restrains a frown. 

“You were gone a long time,” she says, her eyes trained on the fabric on the couch. 

It’s her way of telling him ‘ _I missed you’,_ and she’s ashamed at how she got in so deep so quick. 

“Too long,” he responds. _I missed you, too._

The atmosphere is too serious, something unsaid hangs in between them and it’s in her nature to break it. 

“I’m sure you’re hungry,” she stands up, still off kilter but sobering up nonetheless. “Pizza?”

 

* * *

 

 

Lincoln spends the early hours of the morning watching him sleep. Her california king was big enough to accommodate both of them - regardless of how much Bucky insisted he would be fine on the couch. 

She can’t sleep. She’s got the ex-fist of HYDRA in her bed. One of their most accredited assassins is in her bed. Lincoln wonders when the last time he slept in an actual bed was - what kind of accommodations HYDRA granted to him. It’s hard to imagine the man that’s currently occupying over half of the mattress has tried to kill all of her friends. His actions forcing Fury into hiding, Steve on a wild goose hunt and put all of America on edge. 

But here, he’s different. The hard ridges and angles of his body are soft, his muscles aren’t tense and Lincoln finally sees Bucky. Not the Winter Soldier. Just... _Bucky._ Wearing black sweats and a plain t shirt, he’s curled on his side, his flesh arm half outstretched toward her and it takes everything in her not to mold herself against him. She’s already hurdling over his boundaries and she’s afraid of when she’ll toe over the wrong line. 

So for now, she’ll watch - gladly take a front row seat to his healing process. Share her bed, her food, her life with him until he no longer needs it - until he can be himself. Whether he has to build from old or start from scratch. 

She wants to be there. 

She finds herself reaching forward to intertwine her hand with his when she hears two quiet knocks at her door. Her body goes still as she waits, watches Bucky to make sure he doesn’t wake up. 

Two more knocks. 

She makes her way down from the loft and to her front door, peering into the peephole. She opens the door just enough to enter the hallway and shuts it behind her. 

“Steve.”

“We lost him, the trail. It went cold,” he responds. The anguish on his face is clear and it twists the knot in her stomach. 

“Maybe he just doesn’t want to be found right now,” she says softly. She wraps her arms around Steve’s waist and he all but collapses into her. 

“Maybe,” he murmurs into the top of her head. The top of her head barely reaches his collar bones and all Steve wants to do is wrap himself around her. 

“Can I come in?” He breaks the silence. She removes his head from his chest and she looks up at him. 

His hand comes up to brush against her cheekbone and she doesn’t let herself press against it. 

“I can’t,” her voice breaks, eyes trained on his chest. She can feel his gaze, the furrow of his brow, the concern in his eyes.  “I- I have someone over.”

His grip on her body loosens and he takes a step back. She reaches for him but falls short. 

“Steve, I’m sorry.”

Steve gives her a sad smile. He turns around and walks back down the hallway without a word. 

She falls to the ground against the door and slams her head back against it. 

 

_Great._

  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> woohoo it is plot time!!! things are gearing up i promise!!! college is hectic so stick with me & kudos/feedback are appreciated!


	7. TIED DOWN

When she picked herself up from the floor, after betraying Steve  _ once again _ , she made her way back to bed. Tucked herself under the covers and told herself  _ fuck it _ as she met Bucky’s outstretched hand with her own. Laying on her side, she traced up and down each of his fingers with her index, admiring how such a rough man could have such smooth skin. The pad of her thumb skims over the inside of his wrist, the soft protrusions of his veins and thin white scars. 

Her movements slowed as her eyelids grew heavy. Eventually, they stopped completely. 

“Why’d ‘ya stop?” Bucky murmurs quietly, his voice thick with sleep. 

Her eyes open to look at him, but his are still closed. Lincoln stays quiet for a moment, unsure if he had actually said something. After a few more moments of silence, Bucky’s hand slowly moves to grasp her own. He pulls on it softly, willing her to move closer. She obeys, moving until the front of her body is pressed against the side of his. His eyes are still closed, his breathing slow.

Lincoln hesitantly moves her head onto his chest, their hands intertwined. 

“It’s been so long,” Bucky whispers, “I didn’t think I’d ever get somethin’ like this again.”

She wonders if he can feel her heart break.

* * *

It’d been two weeks since that night, two weeks since she’d been in Bucky’s arms - well, arm. He refused to touch her with his left - and two weeks since she’d heard from Steve. He’d return to New York to stay, she’d learned from Sam. That is, until another lead on Bucky arose. 

“I feel like a bird,” Sam laughed the last time they talked. “Carrying messages between you and Steve. Don’t know why the man can’t send a text.”

Lincoln had one eye in a microscope and both hands tending to a petri dish. “You do know you call yourself Falcon, right?”

She could feel him deflate.

“You and Cap beefin’ or somethin’?” Sam changed the subject. 

Lincoln removed the pipette from her sample and straightened up from the microscope. “Is it beefin’ if it’s one sided?”

Sam paused to think. “He’s a drama queen but I don’t think he’d avoid you if he didn’t have a good reason.”

Lincoln removed her gloves and tossed them in the trash with a huff. “I  _ knew  _ you’d take his side.”

“Hey, when you help someone track down their murderous best friend, ‘ya tend to bond,” Sam defended himself. “Especially when said friend tried to kill you. On multiple occasions.”

Lincoln frowned at the mention of Bucky, the man who’s been inhabiting her apartment these past weeks. If Sam saw him snuggled into her california king bed, he’d probably take back the ‘murderous’ part. The more time she spends around him, the harder it is for her to believe he’s one of the most notorious killers in HYDRA’s history. The man puts creamer in his coffee and sometimes throws his clothes in the dryer before he puts them on so they’re warm. 

Understandably, Bucky hates being cold. 

“Any updates on finding him?” She asked while cleaning up her little experiment. Sam had been sitting on the lab table and made a face at the mush in the petri dish. Lincoln had been trying (unsuccessfully) to create human tissue and cartilage from scratch.

He shrugged. “We know he’s in New York. Someone has to be hiding him since the trail went cold fast.”

“Who would hide him?” Lincoln prodded. 

“Probably some HYDRA homies,” he said nonchalantly. “Or, he’s found a girl. Maybe he’s putting the whole ‘Winter Soldier’ thing,” Sam used his fingers for air quotes, “behind him and is gonna settle down.” 

Lincoln snorted. 

“Cap did that same thing when I offered up the idea,” He said. “Apparently in the 40s, the dude couldn’t be tied down.” 

She looked Sam in the eyes. “Have you seen his military photo? That man was damn fine, can you blame him?”

Sam frowned. “Not really,” he responded and then narrowed his eyes. “You part of the Winter Soldier fan club? You think the man who ripped off one of my wings and threw Steve from the helicarrier is a  _ cutie? _ ”

Lincoln smiled. “The long hair kinda does it for me.”

Sam swung his legs and hopped off the table. “Wow,” he dragged out the word as Lincoln rolled her eyes and chuckled lightly. “I’m right here, and you’re talking about other men.”

Lincoln packed up her things, threw her bag over her shoulder and patted Sam on the chest. “If things don’t work, you’re my back-up.”

Sam followed her out of the lab as she shut off the lights and locked the door through the keypad. He blew her a kiss. “That’s all I want, baby.”

The conversation with Sam was days ago, and currently she was alone in her loft. Bucky tended to come and go like an outdoor cat. Sometimes he was there a lot, other times she was lucky if he came back before she went to bed. She made her way into the kitchen to order something take-out for dinner when she heard the door open and shut. 

Bucky padded into the kitchen a moment later. 

“Hi,” she said without looking up from the stack of menus on the counter. “Hungry?” 

His lack of response caused her to lift her head. He stood across the island, hands in his pockets looking like absolute  _ hell _ . His hair was definitely ratted and caked in grime, he had remnants of blood on his face - no doubt he tried to scrub off as much as he could before he came back - and hid his bloodied and raw knuckles in his pockets. A dark stain was spreading on his side though his face seemed void of pain. He just looked at her. 

She furrowed her brows and wordlessly crossed the kitchen to lift up the battered t shirt. She was met with a very angry bullet hole and as she reached around to his back, there was no exit wound. 

“‘M fine,” he said. 

“You want me to leave the bullet in you? Let you heal around it?” Her voice deadpan as she looked at him blankly. 

“Wouldn’t be the first time,” he responded, pulling his shirt back down. 

She shook her head. “No.”

She pulled the shirt up again and further examined the hole. “Bucky, that bullet is probably sitting in your liver right now.”

“Can’t drink anyway,” he shrugged. 

“I’m gonna kick your ass,” she mumbled as she ghosted her finger over the wound. His abdominals flexed in response and he groaned. “Exactly. I’m taking care of this.”

She grabbed a sweatshirt to throw over her t-shirt and leggings before sliding on shoes and grabbing her bag and keys. “C’mon,” she motioned her head towards the door. 

He didn’t move. “Where are we going?” he asked hesitantly. 

She threw a baseball cap on his head before grabbing his hand and dragging him after her. “If I tell you, you won’t come.”

Less than ten minutes later, Lincoln had snuck him into her lab at Stark Tower, Bucky resisting the whole way. 

“I can’t be here,” the stress in his voice evident. She tried to soothe him as she coaxed him onto the table. 

“It’s the only place I can get the bullet out sanitarily,” she said. “I know you’re super but I don’t want to find out that your one weakness is infection.” 

He shed his shirt along with his baseball hat and laid on the table, his right arm above his head as Lincoln prepared her tools. When she turned back to him, she let out a breath as she looked at his naked torso on his table. He suppressed a smile at her break in composure before she sat down and started disinfecting. 

His head was turned her way, watching her the whole time as she began to remove the bullet. He tried not to move as her forceps dug in to retrieve it. 

“How that didn’t hit anything important is a miracle,” she whispered to herself as she pulled the bullet out and dropped it in the kidney bowl. 

“Disregarding obvious circumstances,” Bucky starts, his eyes meeting hers. “I feel like a lucky guy.”

His voice was low and raspy and filled with countless things unsaid. Lincoln’s face floods with heat as she begins to stitch up the wound. 

“I could agree, Mr. Barnes,” she smiles and continues with her work. Bucky doesn’t understand how Lincoln can look so good with blood on her hands, stitching up his wounds. 

Bucky couldn’t help but admire her like this - brow furrowed in concentration, gloved hands physically putting him together. He liked her like this - it was her element. But he liked her most when she was in bed next to him, her breathing deep and slow, face smooth and limbs sometimes entangled with his own. He wanted every night to be like the one they shared weeks ago, but couldn't bring himself to have the courage to pull him to her side like he did before. So they slept on their respective sides - sometimes touching, sometimes not.

Bucky wasn’t sure how dating worked in the twenty first century, anyways.  _ Did you share a bed with a girl before or after she fixed your mechanical arm and bullet wound? Was it inappropriate to kiss her after? Do people still go dancing anymore? _

He sat up, his legs dangling over the edge of the table as she bandaged her handiwork. It was hard to set the bandage and also not let her hands wander over the ridges and angles of his abdominal muscles. 

So, she didn’t. 

She secured the bandage in place before letting her hands roam, one exploring the expanse of the stomach while the other one traveled its way up his torso, stopping at the nape of his neck. Bucky drew in a breath. 

“I hope you don’t think I’m gonna keep doing this,” she states quietly, her eyes drinking in every inch of his body. 

Bucky  _ definitely _ isn’t flexing on purpose. 

“Won’t happen again,” he answers. Her other hand travels up to cup the side of his face. He swallows. 

His flesh hand moves to grip her waist, pulling her closer to him. His thumb snuck under her sweatshirt to lightly trace circles on the exposed skin. She inhaled quickly. Bucky could feel her pulse, wanted to cup her face with his other hand but refused to ruin the moment with the cold metal. 

He leans into her hand on his cheek, slides his up to cup the side of her face and brings her impossibly closer. 

“Better not,” she whispers back. 

“I’ll be more careful,” and with that, he crashes his mouth onto hers. 

They’d known each other for weeks - was this rushing? Was this overdue? Bucky can’t answer, his mind and all his senses overwhelmed with  _ her _ . As much as he wants to press harder, show her how much this means to him, he’s soft. Her lips mold into his and they move in sync. One of her hands slides into his hair, the other leaving his abdomen to cup his face. Bucky disregards his insecurity and wraps the metal arm around her waist, pulling her closer to him as he slides off the table. She moves back to accommodate him and slides her tongue into his mouth. He responds in tow and elicits a tiny moan from Lincoln. 

_ Seventy years and I still got it,  _ he notes. 

The two are so enthralled with each other they don’t hear the beep of the keypad, the  _ whoosh _ of air that follows the door to the lab opening. 

“Oh, I’m sorry. Must be in the wrong -” the person interrupts. 

Lincoln and Bucky pull away from each other immediately, both turning to the person who entered the room. 

Bruce Banner takes one look at Lincoln and the man she was just kissing. He pinches the bridge of his nose and drops the clipboard he’s holding to his side. 

 

_ “Oh shit,” _ he groans.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hehehehehehe


	8. THIRTY SECONDS

Click [here](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/1YIVZr41jdFGJr3rbVMHCl?si=OVlcXzA8Quq_W-uHhzpw3Q) for the Diluted playlist! 

* * *

“Oh,” Bruce was laughing. “You’ve got to be _kidding_ me.”

“Bruce -” Lincoln started but the words fell flat in her throat. Bucky stood behind her, now clothed and metal arm whirring and flexing as he clenched his fist. Her eyes widened as she turned her back to Bruce and attempted to placate Bucky. 

“Bad idea,” she whispered, one hand on his chest and the other traveling down the smooth metal to unclench his fist, weave her fingers with his. Bucky’s eyes were trained on Bruce, sizing him up and deciding he liked his odds. 

“What am I supposed to tell Tony?” Bruce started again, exasperated. “All these resources spent on Wilson and Cap and you’ve had him the whole time?” 

At the mention of Stark, Bucky subconsciously took a step toward Bruce. Since he entered, he’d been sizing him up and decided he liked his odds. The man who’d walked in on them was the epitome of a lab rat - Bucky felt confident he could take him even without being a super soldier. 

Bruce narrowed his eyes at Bucky’s action and Lincoln turned to him promptly. 

“You don’t want to do that,” she whispered lowly to him, her hands on his chest urging him backwards. “Bruce is a friend, it’s _fine.”_  

Bruce laughed lightly as he removed his thin-wired glasses and placed them in the pocket of his button up. “You wanna listen to her,” he started, meeting Bucky’s eyes. “I’ve got a little bit of an anger issue.”

Lincoln’s eyes were pleading but Bucky refused to look down and meet them. He held Bruce’s gaze with his typical blank expression, yet the scientist regarded him like he was just someone passing on the street. It left Bucky feeling _slightly_ unsettled. 

“ _Dr. Banner,”_ JARVIS cut the tension in the room. _“Mr. Stark requires your assistance.”_

“I’ll meet him in a second,” Bruce responded. 

“ _I’m afraid he’s already on his way_ ,” JARVIS responded. 

Lincoln’s blood ran cold, she could feel Bucky tense beneath her hands. He finally broke his stare to look down at her. She could already see the gears turning in his head, the internal conflict he was dealing with. 

_Run or stay. Stay or run._

He thought about breaking into her apartment back in D.C., her fixing his arm and bullet wound with such precision and care. Sharing a bed with her, molding his lips to hers. He thought about entering her loft to find her wine drunk, spilling her secret about how they’re similar, but she’ll always be less than. 

Finally, he thought about how he saw a picture frame in passing on the wall of her bedroom. A young Lincoln, no doubt. Wide-eyed and grinning as she was embraced by a much older woman. A woman that seemed so familiar to Bucky it left a queasy feeling in his stomach, left him feeling like another puzzle piece had detached itself from the picture he was so desperately trying to form.

 _He couldn’t run even if he wanted to_ , he decided. He was in too deep with the girl before him who had literally been fingers deep in his abdomen moments prior. 

He grasped one of her hands with his flesh one, and that was all she needed. 

Bruce groaned at their actions and seconds later, the lab door opened to reveal none other than Tony Stark. 

Tony was clearly frazzled, wearing a worn AC/DC t-shirt and wrist deep in a bag of pretzels. He’s munching away as he enters. 

“I asked you to grab one thing and it takes you _like, a year_ \- “ Tony was talking to Bruce, but abruptly cut himself off after realizing it wasn’t just he and Bruce in the room. Lincoln’s hands flew from Bucky’s chest as she turned around to face him. 

His brows rose. “Excuse me,” his eyes flicked from Lincoln, to Bucky, and then back to Lincoln. “Who’s your friend?”

Lincoln tried to feign confusion, but she actually felt like she was going to throw up. She pointed her thumb behind her. “Who? This guy?”

“That Barnes?” Tony’s voice was almost an octave higher. 

Lincoln furrowed her brow and tilted her head. She pretended not to hear him and Bruce was convinced he was actually going to end it. Right there and then. Maybe he could make himself Hulk out and he wouldn’t have to be present for whatever the hell was happening right now. Anything would be less painful. Bucky unknowingly shared his sentiments. 

“Abrams, do not pull that with me right now,” Tony warned and she put her hand to her ear, frowning even more. 

“I know you don’t have the man Rogers and Wilson have been on a wild goose chase for standing behind you,” Tony deadpanned and Lincoln knew it was time to stop testing him. 

“Would you believe me if I said I just found him?” She winced.

“Not when you phrase it like that,” Tony responded, incredulous. “How long?” he demanded. 

She didn’t want to tell Tony it was days after the fall of SHIELD, but she voiced it anyway. It sounded worse out loud. 

Tony took a deep breath, sat his bag of pretzels down on the adjacent lab table and stuck his finger in Lincoln’s face. 

“You,” he said slowly, “are responsible for telling Rogers. This is not on me.”

“But-” she began but Tony cut her off. 

“I don’t want to hear it! You did this, you deal with it.”

Lincoln deflated. She knew he was right. She knew what hole she was digging herself into when she lied to Natasha in the hospital, Steve in her kitchen, Sam in the lab, and Steve again the other night outside her loft. She didn’t realize just how deep she was until she was forced to stop and look up. 

And there was no light to be seen.  

“Twenty-four hours, Abrams. You drag your ass to Brooklyn and you take care of it,” Tony stated. Lincoln nodded numbly. 

 

* * *

 

Not a word was shared on the way back to the loft, and even though Bucky wanted to speak, he watched Lincoln grab a bottle of wine and poured herself a nearly full glass and decided against it. 

She couldn’t even look at him. Lincoln leaned against the counter, wine in one hand and the other wrapped around herself. She wasn’t angry at Bucky, she was angry at herself. She couldn’t look at him because if she did, it’d only confirm the thoughts swimming in her head. Thoughts that told her that she didn’t regret it - putting her relationship with Steve in jeopardy. If given another chance, _she’d do it all again._  

Bucky had taken a quick shower and now stood opposite of her, leaning against the island. Her eyes were unfocused, evident that she was lost in her head. She was on her second glass and the alcohol was starting to gain purchase in her bloodstream. He couldn’t take the silence anymore. 

“I didn’t mean to cause any of this,” he said, clearing his throat. “I just needed help. It was selfish to stay.”

Her eyes finally flicked to his. She downed the rest of the glass, not breaking eye contact.  

Her movements were slow, sluggish as she lowered the glass and carefully placed it behind her. He was still damp from the shower, wearing a pair of grey sweatpants and a plain black shirt. His long locks still held moisture as water dripped onto his shoulders. His gaze was soft as she chewed the inside of her cheek and just _looked_ at him. Although it didn’t seem like it, not long ago his lips had been on hers - an action that was well overdue. She wanted to feel them again, mentally scolding herself for not committing them to memory in the moment. 

Maybe it was the wine, the stretch of his shirt over the wide expanse of his chest, or the lack of intimacy she’d had in these last few months, but she felt like she’d risk it all for him. 

She didn’t have a response to his words- too lost in how much she _wanted_ the man stood before her. 

Nevertheless, she pulled herself out of her reverie. 

“What’s done is done,” she said slowly. “I made my own choices.”

She crossed the space between them and found herself running her hand up his prosthetic arm, feeling for any new dents or defects. 

“Is it better?” she questioned. He nodded.

He was extremely tense every time she touched the cool metal, winced when she pressed her forehead against the bright red star on the faux-deltoid. 

“Why do you hate it so much?” she asked.

“You don’t know what it’s done.”

“Do you think that about yourself, too?” 

He didn’t respond. 

She lifted her head and gently pulled the side of his head to face her, though he wouldn’t meet her eyes. His eyes drifted closed as he relished in her hand on his cheek. She thumbed over his cheekbone. 

“It wasn’t you,” she said and felt his jaw clench. He stepped away and her hand fell to her side. 

“Still did it,” he said weakly. He was glaring down at the red star. 

This time, she grabbed his flesh hand. She intertwined their fingers and dragged him behind her as she ascended the stairs towards her bed. 

Whenever he actually came to sleep, Bucky always made sure to sleep on the right side. His metal arm always facing away as she tended to mold herself into his side in the middle of the night. But tonight, she forced him on the left. He frowned as he laid down, reluctant when she pulled the arm around her shoulders and held it close to her chest. 

“It’s just you, Buck,” she said softly, already overcome with sleep. “I just feel you.”

His chest felt like it was going to burst, and he steadied himself by counting the thumps of her heartbeat. Again, he wished he could feel the texture of her skin - not the pressure. 

In seconds, Lincoln was fast asleep. Bucky waited an hour or so for good measure before he gently pulled himself from her grasp and out of bed. 

It took Bucky another hour to change, steal Lincoln’s keys and figure out whatever GPS was to drive to Brooklyn. Another half hour to force himself out of the car, and five minutes to find himself knocking. 

It took less than thirty seconds for Steve to open the door.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> wooohoooo. that's all i gotta say. kudos and comments are encouraged and appreciated i crave feedback!


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